HC tells once again to Jet, Sahara to settle amicably

Suggesting Jet Airways and Sahara India Commercial Corporation Ltd (SICCL) to sit across and try for an amicable settlement to the dispute over multi-crore take over deal of erstwhile Sahara airlines, the Bombay High Court on Friday deferred its order till June 12.

Justice D Y Chandrachud gave a final chance to both the sides to thrash out their dispute amicably after they assured that they were ready to make efforts in this direction. "The Court has deferred the ruling till June 12. There is suggestion that parties should sit down and try to resolve the issue," Jet Airways Counsel Janak Dwarkadas told reporters Mumbai.

If, by June 12, the two parties do not arrive at an out-of-the-court settlement, the court would pass an order. This is not for the first time the court has suggested both to sit down and settle their dispute. Earlier, both tried but could not find out a solution to their dispute.

SICCL had in March filed a petition, claiming that the Naresh Goyal-owned airline had defaulted on the installment amount due as payment for acquisition of Sahara Airlines, now JetLite, hence it was liable to pay original deal amount of Rs 2,000 crore and not re-negotiated amount of Rs 1450 crore.

Jet acquired Sahara Airlines in 2007 for Rs 1,450 crore. It paid Rs 900 crore in cash; and the rest, an amount of Rs 550 crore, was to be paid in four annual installments of Rs 137.50 crore each beginning March 2008.